Freedom
Investments, Inc., has developed a Business Continuity Plan
(BCP) regarding our mission critical functions and how
we will respond to events that may significantly disrupt
our business. This disclosure is being provided to give
you a summary detail regarding our risk mitigation strategy
in the event of significant disruption to our daily
business. Our plan is designed to allow us to continue
to support all obligations to our clients. Our
BCP and this disclosure are intended to comply with
our obligations pursuant to regulatory rules and requirements
as promulgated by the NASD.
Our
plan anticipates two kinds of Significant Business Disruptions
("SBDs"), internal and external. Internal SBDs affect
only our firm's ability to communicate and do business,
such as a fire in our building. External SBDs that may
prevent the operation of the securities markets or a
number of firms including but are not limited to, a
terrorist attack, a city flood, or a wide-scale, regional
disruption. Our response to an external SBD may rely
on assistance from other organizations and systems,
especially on the capabilities of our clearing firm
as we attempt to restore our operating systems or some
alternative that will enable us to accept and process
customer orders and/or requests. Please be advised that
orders and requests for funds may be delayed during
this period.
Our
BCP covers the following areas: mission critical systems,
accurate processing of securities transactions, including
order taking, entry, execution, comparison, allocation,
clearance and settlement of securities transactions,
the maintenance of customer accounts, access to customer
accounts, and the delivery of funds and securities,
financial and operation assessments, alternative communications
with customers, employees, clearing agent and regulators,
alternate physical locations, data back up, regulatory
reporting, dissolution plan if we are unable to continue
our business and assuring our clients prompt and reliable
access to their funds and securities.
Customers'
funds are maintained at the Bank of New York and securities
are maintained by our clearing firm and parent company,
Oppenheimer & Co. Inc. ("OPCO"), which operates various
offices throughout the country. Having locations that
are not effected by the disruption(s) should help us
to relocate our offices and employees. OPCO keeps appropriate
records that are also appropriately backed up.
In
the event of an internal or external SBD that causes
the loss of our paper and hard copy records, we will
attempt to physically recover them from our back-up
files or records management facility. If our primary
site is inoperable, we will continue operations from
our back-up site or an alternate location, as described
above. For the loss of electronic records, we will attempt
to either physically recover the storage media or electronically
recover data from our back-up files records management
facility, or, if our primary site is inoperable, continue
operations from our back-up site or an alternate location.
We
have and continue to evaluate various emergency situations
and have designed multiple potential solutions to meet
each circumstance. With that said, we recognize that
our plan may not address unpredictable disasters and
certain situations that may affect entities that we
rely on for certain services. This BCP is subject to
change without notice. In the event that the BCP is
modified, the updated disclosure will be posted on our
website at www.freedominvestments.com.
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